Russia postpones Soyuz-2.1a rocket launch to Sunday

MOSCOW: Russia has postponed the launch of its Soyuz-2.1a rocket to Sunday, state news agency RIA quoted Roscosmos space agency Director General Dmitry Rogozin as saying on Saturday.

Rogozin said the decision to postpone from Saturday was made after a voltage spike ahead of the planned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, RIA reported.

The Soyuz-2.1a rocket, which is expected to deliver 38 satellites that are mostly made outside Russia into open space, is now set to be launched at 0607 GMT on Sunday, RIA said

The 38 satellites particularly include South Korea’s CAS500-1 remote sensing satellite, Japan’s ELSA-d space junk removal craft, Japan’s GRUS remote sensing microsatellites, Saudi Arabia’s NAJM-1 small satellite pathfinder for Earth observation and communications, and Berlin Technical University’s communications satellites.

The Soyuz rocket is also expected to put into orbit the first D33 satellite of Russia’s Higher School of Economics, a CubeSat developed by the Sirius Center and Higher School of Economics and an OrbiCraft-Zorkiy satellite belonging to Russia’s private company Sputnix.